Very well said.

People often fail to realize that they have a lot more power than they think, when it comes to paying off bills and debt.

Debt collectors lose money the longer you sit on it… and end up selling for pennies on the dollar.

It’s even quite easy to get out of legitimate bills, especially with bigger corporate entities.

I was hit with a $300 fee after I didn’t renew a lease on a car… as well as $200 in repair costs for what was literally a water stain that could be cleaned in 30 seconds (The dealership led me to believe I had purchased basic interior insurance but they never actually put it through, which is why it caught me off guard). They also wanted to charge $300 for a spare set of keys I had misplaced.

I had signed a contract where I explicitly agreed to this, but was still able to get out of ALL of those payments without taking a hit to my credit. I argued that these elements of the contract were not explained clearly and that I was willing to challenge the contract legally, if necessary.

The magic words: “that debt is invalid. I have the ability to pay, but since the debt is invalid I will not be paying anything. I will happily spend more on a lawyer fighting this, than the amount of the debt”.

They’ll do everything they can to get you to admit, in some way, that the debt is valid. If you assert otherwise you impose a significant cost on the collectors that often results in them dropping the whole thing.

Especially for bills less than $1000.